Automatic vending machines have come into wide use in recent years in the fields of various commercial items. The diffusion of automatic vending machines for vending bottled beverages and canned beverages is particularly remarkable and consumers are able to buy bottled beverages and canned beverages easily any time they want. Although bottles and cans containing beverages have different outside diameters, respectively, most of the bottled and the canned beverages can be vended by automatic vending machines.
Incidentally, a dispensing passage of an automatic vending machine suitable for passing an article will be clogged if an article having a diameter greater than that of the article for which the dispensing passage is designed is delivered into the dispensing passage and, if an article having a diameter smaller than that of the article for which the dispensing passage is designed is delivered into the dispensing passage, the article will pass through the dispensing passage, drops and it is possible that many articles are discharged accidentally at a time.
Accordingly, if articles to be vended by the automatic vending machine are changed and new articles having an outside diameter different from that of the articles which have been vended are to be vended by the automatic vending machine, the width of the dispensing passage must be changed to a width conforming to the outside diameter of the new articles.
Referring to FIG. 19, when changing the width of each of dispensing passages 3 connected to the lower ends of divisional passages 2, an exit plate 4 disposed behind the dispensing passage 3 is moved by hand or the exit plate 4 is replaced with another exit plate having a thickness different from that of the exit plate 4 to adjust the width of the dispensing passage properly.
Generally, the dispensing passage 3 is defined by a fixed plate 6 holding a dispensing mechanism 5 capable of dispensing articles A one at a time and fixed to the body of the automatic vending machine, and a exit plate 4 disposed opposite to the fixed plate 6. As shown in FIG. 20, the exit plate 4 is held in place by fitting pins 7 and 8 projecting from the opposite sides of an upper end portion and a lower end portion thereof in positioning slots 9 and 10. The plurality of lower positioning slots 10 are formed in a shape resembling the inverted letters U at positions respectively corresponding to the diameters of articles. The plurality of upper positioning slots 9 are formed continuously in a shape resembling continuous cranks. The exit plate 4 disposed at a position a, b, c or d conforming to the outside diameter of the articles A by placing each of the lower pins 8 in the bottom of one of the positioning slots 10.
Referring to FIG. 21, in another automatic vending machine, the exit plate 4 is supported so as to be moved to either of two positions corresponding to the positions b and d shown in FIG. 20. As illustrated in FIGS. 22A and 22B, an width adjusting plate 11 is attached to the exit plate 4 by engaging hooks 12 formed by raising portions thereof so as to project from the back surface thereof with holes formed in the exit plate 4, the exit plate 4 thus provided with the width adjusting plate 11 is disposed at the position corresponding to the position b shown in FIG. 20 to set the width adjusting plate 11 at a position corresponding to the position a shown in FIG. 20 for an article A.sub.1 having a minimum diameter (FIG. 22A), and the exit plate 4 provided with the width adjusting plate 11 is disposed at the position corresponding to the position d shown in FIG. 20 to set the width adjusting plate 11 at a position corresponding to the position c shown in FIG. 20 for an article A.sub.3 having a medium diameter (FIG. 22B).
The replacement of articles having a diameter with those having a different diameter is executed frequently every year when replacing hot articles with cold articles and vice versa, when a new item is introduced into the market and when replacing articles which are in good demand with those which are not in much demand. and the width of the passages must be adjusted every time the articles are changed. The adjustment of the width of the passages requires heavy work because operations for changing the width of the passages are carried out by touch in a stained position in the lower portion of the automatic vending machine as shown in FIG. 19.
Since the result of width adjustment cannot be visually confirmed, the ratio of cases where correct width adjustment cannot be achieve is very high. Therefore, only limited operators are able to operate the automatic vending machine under the present circumstances. Accordingly, the width adjusting function is rarely used, the width of the passage is kept fixed in most cases, and the width adjusting function is kept idle.
The number of the automatic vending machines for vending beverages on the domestic market of Japan estimated by the related trade is well over 2,500,000 and the commercial useful life of the automatic vending machines is in the range of about five years to about seven years. Therefore, the old automatic vending machines are replaced with new ones every year at a considerably high ratio. However, the width adjustment of the passages is necessary because the rest of the automatic vending machines are used continuously for the rest of their useful lives. Particularly, when changing articles at the turn of the seasons, the width of the passages of many automatic vending machines must be changed in a short period. Therefore automatic vending machine makers need a huge sum of money to secure and train the personnel necessary for width adjustment and to repair automatic vending machines clogged with articles having inappropriate diameters loaded into the automatic vending machines by mistake.
Prior arts intended for alleviating difficulties in carrying out the work for width adjustment are proposed in JP-A No. 7-21457 (cited reference 1) and JP-A No. 7-160941 (cited reference 2).
The prior art disclosed in the cited reference 1 operates temporary stopping flaps for small-diameter cans and large-diameter cans by solenoid actuators to make the width of the passages conform to the size of articles. The prior art disclosed in the cited reference 2 adjusts first to third stoppers by solenoid actuators to make the width of the passages conform to the size of articles.
Both those prior arts are applicable only to automatic vending machines which vends articles of limited sizes and is not applicable to automatic vending machines which vends various articles of different outside diameters. The prior art which operates the flaps has difficulty in adjusting the relation between the solenoid actuators and the flaps, and troubles are liable to be caused by the unsatisfactory relation between the solenoid actuators and the flaps.